Title of sound recording: Oral History Interview with James Arthur
Jones, November 19, 2003. Interview U-0005. Southern Oral History
Program Collection (#4007)

Title of series: Series U. The Long Civil Rights Movement: The South
Since the 1960s. Southern Oral History Program Collection (U-0005)

Author: Malinda Maynor

Title of transcript: Oral History Interview with James Arthur Jones,
November 19, 2003. Interview U-0005. Southern Oral History Program
Collection (#4007)

Title of series: Series U. The Long Civil Rights Movement: The South
Since the 1960s. Southern Oral History Program Collection (U-0005)

Author: James Arthur Jones

Description: 172 Mb

Description: 44 p.

Note:
Interview conducted on November 19, 2003, by Malinda
Maynor; recorded in Prospect Community, Robeson County, North Carolina.

Note:
Transcribed by Sharon Caughill.

Note:
Forms part of: Southern Oral History Program Collection
(#4007): Series U. The Long Civil Rights Movement: The South Since the
1960s, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill.

Note:
Original transcript on deposit at the Southern
Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill.

Editorial practicesAn audio file with the interview complements this electronic edition.The text has been encoded using the recommendations for Level 4 of the TEI in
Libraries Guidelines.Original grammar and spelling have been preserved. All quotation marks, em dashes and ampersand have been transcribed as entity
references.All double right and left quotation marks are encoded as "All em dashes are encoded as —

Interview with James Arthur Jones, November 19, 2003. Interview U-0005.
Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)

Jones, James
Arthur, interviewee

Interview Participants

JAMES
ARTHUR JONES, interviewee
MALINDA
MAYNOR, interviewer

[TAPE 1, SIDE A]

Page 1

[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]

MALINDA MAYNOR:

: Are we ready to go? Okay, this is tape number 11.19.03-JJ with James A.
Jones in the Prospect Community in Robeson County. The interviewer is
Malinda Maynor, and it's November 19, 2003. Okay. So, Mr. Jones, begin
by telling us a little bit about teaching at the Veteran's School, what
you remember about that experience and its rewards and trials.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That was one of my great, not the greatest probably, but one of my great
moments of teaching veterans who had had the same, similar, experience
in the Army as I had. They came back, and they were not highly educated.
Most of them were down in the primary level of education, probably
seventh and eighth grade. The government made possible for funds that
were provided for teachers. They came in, and at that time that program
was held right at Prospect School, in the high school room, and the
hours were from four until nine, five days a week. The soldiers seemed
to enjoy it. I enjoyed it. During that time we would take a break, and
we organized one of the finest volleyball teams anywhere in the district
or even in the county. We went to other areas. We went down to adjoining
counties and played. We were very, very competitive. This was an
enlightenment. The fellows would look forward to this. They were there.
Had no problem with them. Attendance was good. The relationship was
excellent. No discipline problem because they were there for one thing,
to increase their education level. It was just a great, enjoyable
experience.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What kinds of students did you have?

Page 2

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

All Indian boys. All Indian boys. Well, we had one white who lived in
the area, and his name was Dillon Maynor, and he wanted to come and be a
member of the class. He was a veteran like the rest of them. The rest of
them was all Prospect related individuals.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Maybe we could talk a little bit about Prospect since you were born
here, grew up here, and went to school here. How would you describe the
community if you were talking to somebody from outside? What would you
tell them about it?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

This is predominantly, almost a hundred percent—at one time it was, with
the exception of two or three families—a Native American community, a
very close knit community. There were a lot of family relations, family
connections in this Prospect community. And it's very deep. It goes way
back to probably the eighteenth century. The land that's in this area,
most of the land in this Prospect community is land that has been
inherited from our ancestors. It's just been passed down, passed down,
passed down from generation to generation. Not a lot of selling lands,
especially to outsiders.

It's kind of clannish if you'll allow me to us that word. We sometimes
refer to it facetiously as a little Indian reservation. We like to kind
of keep it that way. We've got our prejudice feelings you know, not
really deeply imbedded, but we get along. We've gotten along, and we're
hard working, dedicated people from the farming aspects and move up the
ladder on the educational level. We have no qualms about that, and we
feel like the kids, the students, every one has made progress from about
as long as I can remember, and I was born here eighty some years ago,
right here. Lived in this community. In fact I've lived in this spot
where we are talking right now since 19—oh, I

Page 3

was
eight years old probably when I moved here. That was in 1930. I've been
living in this same spot since 1930.

I attended church here in this same area. My father and mother taught us.
They took us to church religiously. Every Sunday we were in church, and
we didn't give excuses. "I feel bad today," or "I'm not feeling so well.
I don't want to go." It was understood that Sunday morning we were going
to church. It was imbedded in us, and we still have a trickling of that
in our community and in our families, and we believe in hard working,
fair, honesty. Back then we didn't have to worry about locks on the
doors and that kind of thing. If there was a neighbor in need we were
ready to come to his rescue.

I remember as a little boy I'd go to the other families. I take maybe a
dozen of eggs and bring back some milk or vice versa. We did that. Now
we even exchange. We like to go and borrow something or take something
and bring back something. This is typical Prospect community as long as
I can remember.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What makes education so important to the people in Prospect?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

We feel that's the level of advancement. We feel like that's somewhat
part of our livelihood because the greater our education, the more
experiences we have, we can share that with our children and motivate
them to seek higher grounds. And naturally the bottom line is financial
status, upgrading, better homes, better economic conditions, provide the
elders with better medicine.

My mother passed away when she was thirty-nine years old with a simple
gall bladder. Now today you never hear tell of that. They go in there
and remove your gall bladder, do whatever is necessary and that's it.
But back then it was a separate thing, and it took her away at only
thirty-nine years old. It was sad. So we felt like these are the

Page 4

kind of things that we need to do. With all the
developing technology that we have now, we've got to do something to try
to stay up with it.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So education improves your quality of life?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Exactly right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It's interesting though because in a lot of other places in the United
States people would leave to improve their quality of life.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

They wouldn't stay. Why do you think so many of the younger generation
have stayed in Prospect?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Because of the general environment. We have a good, strong religious
background. We get along well. We communicate well. And these are the
things that hold us real close. We're unity. We like to practice this
kind of thing. We like to talk it, and we like to practice it, and this
causes us—we don't want to leave. We want to stay here, even our kids.
Most of them don't want to leave the Prospect community. This is one of
the things that merging of schools, and you've already related to this.
We felt that this was not going to be good for Prospect kids, and it's
proven that it's not. It's the most detrimental thing. Maybe I shouldn't
say that, but I'm being totally honest. It's probably the most
detrimental thing that's happened to the Prospect community and the
young kids. Our kids were taught hard work. They were disciplined kids.
We were strict-discipline kids. And the community here has always gone
to school until the administrator, whoever it was that, "Listen, if my
child needs discipline, you discipline him. And when he gets home I'm
going to give him more discipline because we can't allow it." The school
is for education, not to go out there and get in trouble.

Page 5

We never had any problems at Prospect. Maybe the boy pulled the girl's
hair or vice versa, but something like that. Maybe take a sheet of paper
from him or chew chewing gum. That was probably the extent of the
discipline problems.

And another thing in the school line, one of the things that we strive
for from the athletic side, we wanted the sportsman's trophy for our
kids. That's the one thing. We wanted to be victorious. We wanted to be
the winner, but we also wanted to show sportsmanship, and a number of
years our teams got the sportsmanship award. We also stress the fact
that we're good citizens. We like to get the citizenship award, too, you
know. Like one little thing, helping the neighbor in need. We practice
that.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What do you think sets Prospect apart from some of the other Indian
communities?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's not an easy question to deal with because I really don't know the
other Indian sections as well as I do Prospect because I haven't been
exposed to them. Maybe because I'm kind of clannish myself and live
here, although I visit these other sections, but I didn't mingle in them
enough to give you what I would consider a very true, educated
evaluation.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Um-hum.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Maybe that's where I should have spread out a little bit more. I had the
opportunities to go out. I was asked to go to the other communities, but
I never really had the desire to. I wanted to stay here and felt like it
could be more beneficial, more helpful to the kids. The scripture says
charity begins at home, so I believe in practicing this, and I wanted
these kids to have the best. We strived for that. We strived for
that.

Page 6

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What about like last time you were telling me maybe from when you were
in school, but then also when you were principal, some of the rivalries
between Pembroke and Prospect, for example, you know, Union Chapel and
the different types of things. What were those types of rivalries
about?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Sports was the main thing. We wanted to beat Pembroke, and it was
reciprocal, vice versa. Pembroke wanted to beat Prospect. They always
referred to us as the "Upaheaders." We were "Upaheaders." That was a
slogan that was used back then. We didn't really resent that to the
extent that it caused any trouble, but our main objective was to beat
Pembroke. Prospect School won the first championship game that was
played in the university there, in the gymnasium.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What year was that?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Oh, what year was that? That was in 41.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Nineteen forty-one.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Nineteen forty-one.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Prospect won. It was a county tournament.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

An Indian county tournament?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

An Indian county tournament. Then that's all we played, Indian schools,
you see, because each on of the schools were individual. All the towns
around had their schools, like Red Springs School, Maxton School
District, Rowland School District, Fairmont District, and Lumberton
District. We did not intermingle with them in the sports. It was only
the Indian schools who were able to compete among themselves.

Page 7

Now once in a while, we at Prospect School, we went
up to Moore County and played up in there some of those schools up
there.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Indian schools or white schools?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No, white schools. We kind of break out of our—. Mr. Carlie Lowry was
instrumental in bringing about that. We played Star and Bisco which is
up there. Those are the two schools that we played. Once in a while we
did go down and play in Bennettsville. We played Bennettsville in South
Carolina a couple of times. This was just in sports.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

I wonder when you mentioned the volleyball team for the Veteran's
School—?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Um-hum, right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Who did that team play?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

There was a school down in Bladen County, and they had a Veteran's
School down there. They were doing the same thing, and we competed
against them.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Were they Indians as well?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah, they were Indians.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's interesting. So even in the Veteran's School it was sort of an
Indian-only thing.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Exactly right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Describe for us a little bit for us when you were in school at Prospect
Elementary and High School, what the conditions were like. What was a
normal day for you like when you were in school?

Page 8

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I began school out here in the first grade. We went to school, back then
we had our opening ceremonies in our auditorium. All the students came
together. We had an assembly, and it was called a chapel program. The
scripture was read, prayer was done, and we said the Pledge of
Allegiance, and we sang America the Beautiful. That was the beginning of
our day. We went back to classes, and then in mid-morning we had a
fifteen-minute recess. Then at lunchtime, twelve o'clock, we had no
cafeterias as we have now. All the kids brought their lunch. At
lunchtime we had an hour for lunch, from twelve to one. We'd go outside
and play whatever sport time it was. It was either football, or it would
be basketball, or baseball, or softball for the girls. Then three
o'clock we dismissed to come home. That was a typical school day.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What were the relationships with your teachers like?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Good, good. The teacher was there all the time. Now, as far as the lunch
hour the teachers did not go out and organize. We did it on our own, and
we had no problems. The teachers were not demanded to go out. Once in a
while some of the teachers who were sports minded, they'd come out and
watch, but they really didn't do the kind of coaching that you have
going on in the schools now. They were more or less maybe an advisor or
something of that nature, an observer, but we had no problems.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So the sports were kind of self-organized? Is that right?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Self-organized. It was self-organized.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's interesting. And the tournaments and things like that?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No, now the tournaments, when we got into that level where we were
beginning to compete on the high school level, we did have organized. We
did have

Page 9

coaches, but I was talking primarily now
from the K-through—back then from the first through the eighth
grade.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right. Okay. That makes sense.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

In the high school it was organized. We had coaches back then, but it
was all Indians. When we'd get ready to play a game, we'd go play a game
during the lunch hour, load up the kids in cars, and the teachers would
go sometimes to take them to play, and they'd bring them back during the
lunch. That's the way we worked. It was all Indian schools. Go down to
Fairgrove. Go down to Green Grove. Go down to Magnolia and these
schools. We always had the teachers with us there. The teachers would
drive their car and carry the kids.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

You now, it's interesting that it sounds like a very prosperous
community, but I also know that a lot of Indian children have the
experience of having to stay out of school to help their parents on the
farm and things like that.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Could you talk a little bit about some of the economic differences in
Prospect. Were there wealthier people and poorer people? Was everybody
sort of the same? How did that work?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

We had a few people, and I won't call names in this situation. We had a
few people that was considered upper-echelon because they were greater
land owners that the others. Then we had some who were tenant farmers.
It was difficult for them.

We had a few Indian kids who had to stay out of school until the crops
were harvested in the fall of the year. Even at one time school was
delayed until the crops could be harvested, or they would do a half a
day. Come to school at lunchtime or

Page 10

dismiss at
lunch so they could go home, and especially in harvesting the tobacco in
the fall of the year, trying to get the tobacco in. We delayed school
until we got the tobacco harvested. We considered that, and I thought at
that particular time it was an asset because you were helping the
farmers, and their only livelihood and the only help they had then—they
didn't have big tractors like we have now, mechanized—it was all hand
done. Cotton was picked with hands. With hands, all of it until it was
gathered.

Let me share one incident that happened when I was a seventh grade
teacher. We needed some shrubbery at our school, and we took the
classes, not all the classes, but our particular class. Maybe just two
or three classes. We went out in the community and picked cotton, and
the farmers paid us for picking, so much per pound. That money was
brought back to the school and in turn the principal bought shrubbery,
and we brought it to the school, and the kids helped plant the shrubbery
around the school. Those are the kind of things that we did. I don't
know if any other community did that or not, but we at Prospect did
that.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right. No money was coming from the county?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No money was coming from the county for shrubbery, beautification. It
was all school- related activities.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That helps us transition a little bit then to your experience of the
school system and how that worked in let's say the 50s. If you could
start then. If you maybe would talk a little bit about the school
committees, and what kind of relationship the school and the school
committee, and then the county school board had.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

The best I can recall this, the county superintendent made the final
decision, but each school had what they called a local committee, and
this committee screened the

Page 11

teachers, and they were
somewhat very, very rigid. At one time if a teacher was married, a lady
teacher, they were not allowed to teach school. If she got pregnant,
that was it, right then and there. She didn't teach any longer. Some of
those things were very, very rigorous. Sometimes I think they made a lot
of good decisions, but sometimes I wondered about some of the decisions
that they made.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Give us an example of a good one and a not so good one.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Okay. I won't call a name in this situation. I remember one teacher, she
was an excellent teacher, and she was married, and she got pregnant
during her marriage which is a normal thing. They found out that she was
pregnant. They dismissed her immediately from teaching school. If I'd
call her name now you would know, and your daddy would know, and it
would get back to everybody. We thought this was awful, because she was
one of the better teachers in the school system at that time. But that's
the way the committee operated. I think that was devastating.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Was there any way, could anybody have appealed that decision?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Well, it was a ruling, and the committee made the ruling and they abided
by it. They may have talked about it, but there was nothing ever put in
concrete to eliminate it. Finally, you know, it elevated from that and
they did away with the committee, and then the board of education came
in and started to take over, and the superintendent, and the principal
made recommendations and then the board put the final approval on it and
this kind of thing. I think it kind of helped a lot.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It was more fair, maybe?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah. Yeah.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Why did the school committee have so much power?

Page 12

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's a question. I didn't really get into it back then, and I don't
know. It looked like the people who were selected were just powerful
people from that political standpoint, and they were very domineering.
The way they felt, and the way they observed things, and their deep
feelings, were so powerful. They were just so powerful that nobody would
really revoke any of those situations. Once in a while they would, but
most times, "That's the way it is. Okay." And the community knew that,
and they kindly abided by those things. If a lady got pregnant she'd
keep that concealed as long as she possibly could, because this was of
concern back then.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It wasn't like it is now where people can just work all the way
through.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's right. Work all the way through, that's right. And maybe go and
stay out six weeks, something like that, and come right back in.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

I wonder, were the members of the school committee connected to the
church as well? Was there an interrelationship?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Not necessarily.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Some of them were. Some were not. But they were widespread. It wasn't
like we have now, districts or anything like that, but it was just
certain people who were selected to serve.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Go back again and tell us who selected them.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Well, usually the superintendent had some input and the principal was
very instrumental, and said, "I'd like for Mr. Joe," or "I'd like for
Sister Mary to be a member," a school committee member.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

Page 13

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

But most times, believe it or not, most times it was men, very seldom
the ladies had any voice. That's the way it operated. That's the way it
operated.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What about deciding, in the case of schools, what Indian children were
eligible to go to a particular school? Did the school committee have any
say-so over that?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Very little. You know, Ms. Maynor, I really am not sure when the
district lines were drawn up. It was just understood that all of the
Prospect people, the Indians that were living in this Prospect community
went to Prospect School. Usually that [highway] 710 was kind of the
dividing line. That was a natural boundary. Then those kids went there.
Oxendine which is above us up here, at that time it was called Cherokee,
the students and families lived in that area, they went to Cherokee
School. And the same thing was so in Magnolia, down in Fairmont, down in
Green Grove, Fairgrove, the Magnolia section, the kids who surrounded
the school. It was a long time to the best of my knowledge before any
real district lines were drawn up like they are now.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right. Well, it's just interesting to note for people who aren't from
here, who aren't familiar with the community, that everybody knew each
other well enough to really know.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right. To really know.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

I know it's hard because you've been in the middle of it, but if you
could just tell us a little bit about how people knew. What was the way?
How would you, for example, know whether someone belonged to the
Prospect community?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Where he resided in his home. Where he lived. If he lived in that area,
I knew he was supposed to go to Pembroke School. If he lived in this
area like up here to Red Hill area, all those students we knew they were
coming. Over to the Philadelphus

Page 14

area—and by the
way, that's one I didn't even mention. Philadelphus had a little school
system over there, and that was white, and we didn't have any operation
with them whatsoever. And all the kids around the Buie section, we
didn't have any kids out of there. They had their own school over there,
and it was all white. We didn't have many kids living out in these
outlying areas. Once in a while a family lived there, but they'd have to
make their way.

We had the buses go through, and the buses only picked up the Indian
children and brought them to the Indiana school. The whites picked up
the white kids and took them to the white school. Fortunately, we had
one black family as long as I can remember lived less than two miles up
the road up here at the old Red Springs road, and the bus came from Red
Springs and got those kids, and took them over there as long as I can
remember. That's the way it operated.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It's interesting because a lot of what we're trying to figure out with
this project is how that segregation system was enforced, because it
seems so easy in some ways to be able to cross lines depending on your
circumstances, but it sounds like in this community it wasn't an
issue.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No, it wasn't. Now, when we really had an issue was when they drew up
the district lines, and that was about the time, maybe '70s. Right there
about '70s, when they drew the Maxton line up there, and they came all
the way out to Red Hill Road. At Red Hill Road the kids on this side,
let's say the east side, they came to Prospect and Oxendine schools. It
was Indians, mostly Indians. The kids on the west side of that Red Hill
Road, they had to go to Maxton. That's when we really had a little war,
a little war so to speak.

Page 15

The students, their parents resented it. They said, "I went to Prospect
School. My children's going to Prospect School." We even had a little
conflict with Oxendine students in Prospect—the parents, not the
students, but the parents. The parent says, "I went to Prospect School.
My children's going." And they were really living in the Oxendine School
District. I remember when I became principal the superintendent asked us
to go out and talk to these parents, and we did, the principal of
Oxendine School and myself. We went out and talked to them. They told us
point blank, "We're not going to Oxendine School. I went to Prospect
School. My children are going to Prospect School. My grandchildren are
going," and that's how dynamic they were. And it happened until
eventually it went to court and finally got it established. Still, just
recently, the last couple of years, they've reorganized. Last year, I
think, they redistricted. It took effect last year, and it's going to
take effect, I understand, this school year even more than it did
because you've got an influx especially of Oxendine School. Red Springs
School came and got Indian kids within, well, right beside the school.
You know the Oxendine School Road? Okay, Red Springs School District
went to the school property line, dropped behind the school property
line, came back and joined that right above the school property line,
and everything from there west that was Red Springs. And they was as
close to the school, those kids, as from here to the next house, a
quarter of a mile. They had to go to Red Springs. Now that was awful.
That was awful.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What was the purpose?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's the way the set up the district lines.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Yeah? Why do you reckon they set them up that way?

Page 16

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I guess they wanted to keep the enrollment of their school up, and
that's the way the district lines were drawn. It caused so much hard
feelings. The Indians wanting to come—they didn't want to go to Red
Springs, but they were just about forced to go to Red Springs. As I was
telling you earlier, the same thing was true with Oxendine. They didn't
want to go to Oxendine. They wanted to go to Prospect because their
parents had. This is the kind of thing—it was not an easy battle. It was
not an easy battle, but eventually I think it's somewhat resolved.

But now they've reopened because of the educational levels and federal
compliances, and state compliances. If "X" school is not doing as well
as "B" school, or "Y" school, then they have given the parents the
prerogative, "Well, if you're not satisfied," and that's happened this
year I understand, I've been told that, "If you're not satisfied with
your child going to "Y" school, and you want to put him in "X" school,
come down and we'll arrange it, and put him over there." I don't know
whether that's the best thing from an educational standpoint. Maybe
some. But then that creates a lot of animosity.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right. Right.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

It does.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Well I know that there was a time in the 50s, late 50s and early 60s
where people were doing that.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

They were deciding not to go to the schools they had been assigned to.
Tell us about that period of time.

Page 17

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Now, we had that. We had a few. There again, that's where a big law suit
came about when that happened. I don't mind telling you. I had a
classroom full of kids. Back then we had trailers. We had a classroom of
about thirty-some kids that were assigned to Oxendine School. Their
parent's says, "We're not going to let them go there. They're going to
Prospect School." Now, we couldn't keep them off the bus, and I was
principal at this time.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So this was 72?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Seventy-two.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Okay, the bus picked them up, brought them to school. They went to the
cafeteria like all the other students, but I could not enroll those kids
in Prospect School. I could not give those kids books. If you want to
enroll you're not going to get books. Did not furnish a teacher for
them. Those kids sat there one whole year, and the only instruction they
got, I took it on my part. I said, "I'm not going to let them stay there
a whole year without some kind of guidance." Couldn't get books. I got a
letter from the superintendent specifically spelling this out, and I
told the parents. I read the letter to the students. It was the sixth,
seventh, and eighth grade kids.

I says, "Now, you boys and girls understand this is the letter from the
superintendent, and I must abide by what the superintendent says, or
otherwise I won't have a job. That's how important this is. Now, you
either do this or you get out." So I read it to them, and I told them
that they had all the other privileges that any other kid had there.
They went out and played. So I brought in a teacher's aide. I assigned a
teacher's aide to that classroom. She stayed there the whole year. I
said, "Take these kids to the

Page 18

library. Film
projectors. Film strips. Library books. Use them. However you see the
interest of these kids, and you keep them moving. Keep them going." I
said, "They're not going to run all over the campus. They're going to
operate just like another class. You're their teacher, and you've got to
carry this out, and I expect you to carry it out. You're the teacher,
not on paper as far as the Board, but you're Prospect's teacher, and
you're these kids' teacher, so I expect you to carry it out and be the
teacher." We got along with it.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

How many kids?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Thirty-some kids.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay. And these are parents that lived on the west side of Red Hill
Road?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's exactly right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Wow.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

In fact, some of them lived this side, and they were supposed to go to
Oxendine School, but they resented it. They're parents said, "I'm not
going there."

MALINDA MAYNOR:

But Oxendine was an Indian school?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Oh, definitely, but just because tradition, that they went to Prospect
School. Sometimes it's hard to break them. You know, Indian traditions
are tough. They were tough. It wasn't always easy to deal with.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

How did the situation get resolved?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

They went to the Board of Education and they had a law suit. They had a
law suit about it, and finally some of those parents—and I talked with
them so much. I said, "You're hurting nobody but your child and your
grandchild. You're depriving that child of an education. Go on to
Oxendine School because Oxendine School is a feeder school

Page 19

to Prospect. Let them go there until the seventh grade or
eighth grade, they're coming on to Prospect to the high school." I said,
"You're not getting any education for them." I said, "You're hurting
nobody but you and your child." So, they gradually [unclear] in, and it evolved.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So they sort of accepted it over time?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah, they finally accepted.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

To what extent, because I know that this was at the same time that the
county board was trying to send Blacks to Prospect, so were those two
issues related?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No, not at that time. They were not. Now, we had at that time, I think I
told you this before, that was not an issue because we only had about
four black kids that was coming at that time, and about four or five
white was coming at that time. That particular issue was not interwoven
or related anything to the blacks or the whites. That didn't really
happen until they brought about the greater district areas and began to
force the integration. That's when that developed, when they started
forcing.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Let's talk about that time period then. About what year then are we
talking about?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That had to be in the seventy—let's see, 64, 65, 66—That was in the 70s
when that really evolved.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

And the whites didn't want to come. We had some whites from Oxendine. We
had some whites from the Philadelphus area over there, in the Buie
section there. Those kids, they came to school here because they drew
the district lines, and it so happened it went out that way and brought
them. But that wasn't near as bad as later

Page 20

when
things really—they began to put all force on, and you've got to adhere
to the district lines. That's when the Board of Education really got it,
and they said to the schools, "You shall not, you will not enroll a kid
outside of your school district." That's when it really came to the
surface, and the parents then had to go down to the Board of Education
and deal with them, not the principal. [unclear]. They had guidelines, and parents knew. Guidelines. "We can't go
to the principal now. It's out of his hands. We've got to go to the
Board of Education." That's when they had the ruckus with the kids, and
the Board of Education had to deal with that, and the individual schools
didn't have to do nothing.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Now the last time we were talking about Mr. Danford and the
circumstances— Why don't we talk for a minute about your working
relationship with him when he was principal during the 60s, and then
moving into the circumstances around his resignation and you taking
over, mostly that story that you told me last time.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Oh, yes. This was when really integration began to bloom so to speak. I
was assistant principal. Mr. Danford was the principal at that
particular time. That was in the 70s. The Indian people of Prospect
community resented strongly having any black students to come to
Prospect School. Mr. Danford being the principal made a commitment, and
that was his decision, and that was even after the Federal Government
decision on integrating, '64. He said, "Don't you worry. I'm not going
to have any Black kids come to this school. They're not coming." Well,
Mr. Danford and I, our relationship was always superb. He was my
superior, and I was loyal to my superior, and he knew that I supported
him. But he and I, one-on-one, I said, "Mr. Danford," I said, "This is
the Federal Government now. I don't believe that we're going to be
able," and he just point blank told me. He said, "Yes,

Page 21

they're not coming here as long as I'm principal." Well, I
still had to be loyal to him. He was the principal. He made decisions,
and I had to go along with them, and I didn't resent it. I said, "Okay,
that's your decision," but I said, "I'm afraid it might not. You may
have some problems coming back." So it really surfaced now. It really
surfaced, opened in the fall of '71. They came, the law enforcement, and
they had heard what was going to happen. The Black's has got to come.
The government says they've got to come. The state says they've got to
come. The county says they've got to come. Mr. Danford, the principal,
says, "They're not coming."[Laughter]

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

But anyway, it surfaced. That September morning—I believe it was
September, but anyway of 71, and the law was here. The troopers was
here, and everybody, all waiting, well from James' [Moore's] station all
the way back the other way, and the streets were lined. We got to school
that morning, and everybody they came. Some of the Blacks came. They
didn't want to come. They didn't want to come, but the law says, 'You
gotta come. That's your designated school. You've got to go." It
happened, and it happened to be the time, power, force, but it didn't
really get out of hand as far as any fighting, or any cutting, shooting.
Nothing like that ever happened, but they were just forcing their way.
They says, "We're going to school there. Irregardless we're going to
school." The deputies didn't go and pick up anybody and put them in the
van and take them back. They never did suffer that.

Mr. Danford, about ten o'clock that morning, he says," I'm going to the
Board of Education. I'm going to resign." I said, "Mr. Danford, please
don't do that. Please."

Page 22

"Oh," he says, "I'm going.
I'm leaving this with you. I'm going to resign." I hated it because Mr.
Danford was a good administrator. He was very strict. He was very
strict. Discipline problems? We had no discipline problems. He was very
strict, and the kids knew that, and the teachers. We all knew, and we
was loyal to him. He was a good administrator, a good educator, but he
went, and he didn't come back.

And I'll call names, Mr. Harbert Moore and Herman Dial, who is deceased.
We met with him that afternoon down at Herman Dial's home. That's where
Tara is living right now, she and her husband, and we pleaded with Mr.
Danford, and he strongly rejected. He says, "Gentlemen, I've resigned.
I'm not coming back. Your plea is of no avail." He says, "I'm not coming
back now." Well, we stayed with him I know until about maybe three or
four, almost sundown on that particular day. We left, and then Mr. Allen
told me, "we're going to make you acting." He asked me in the next day.
He called me to the Board of Education, and all the board members was
there. Malcolm McLeod was Sheriff. He was there, and they asked me—

[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]

[TAPE 1, SIDE B]

[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay, go ahead, acting principal.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

They asked me would I accept the position as acting principal, and I
told them, I says, "I have one request," and I would accept it on this,
"that you give Mr. Danford two or three weeks to reconsider," because I
felt that I could convince Mr. Danford to come back, plus with Mr.
Harbert and Mr. Herman and myself dealing with him. Well, I had a
relationship, and we all had a good relationship in the community.

Page 23

And they says, "If that's your request, we'll honor
that request, and effective today you will be acting principal of the
school."

So I came on back to school, and we started trying to operate as a
normal situation. We did. We got along real good. That's when I asked
Mr. William C. Chavis. We called him Mr. Can. Everybody knew him as Mr.
Can, William C. Chavis. I asked him would he assist me, be my assistant,
and he said he would, so we established a good relationship, and it went
on like that knowing that his was as temporary as mine was at that
particular time and situation there. I said, "We don't know what will
happen." Mr. Can was a history teacher at that time. Mr. Chavis, I
should say. I'm using everyday terminology.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's all right.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I use it so much. But, anyway, he said he would. I said, "We don't know
what's going to happen with Mr. Dial," and went on. After Mr. Allen
asked me to serve, said, "When's Mr. Dial coming back, Mr. Jones?" I
said, "Mr. Allen, we' working on it. Give us another few days on it." So
Mr. Allen was very lenient. He went the limit, beyond the limit, because
I wasn't pushing because at that particular time I wasn't really anxious
about being the principal. I was happy doing what I was doing, and then
we were getting along real good, had a good relationship. Everything was
just going great as far as I was concerned. But he refused, and he still
refused. He kept refusing, never would accept, so eventually he says we
got to do it, so then they made me a principal, certified me as
principal. And I told Mr. Chavis, I said, "Well, Mr. Can, it kind of
looks like I'm going to be the principal according to the Board of
Education, and I want you to be my

Page 24

assistant." So I
accepted the principal's position, and Mr. Can accepted the assistant
principal's position.

Then shortly after that, sometime later in the year, Mr. Allen told me,
he says, "Mr. Jones, now, you're going to have to go get your Masters
degree." I didn't have a Masters degree. That's a requirement to be a
principal, to have a Masters degree. He asked me was I willing to do
that. I said, "Well, I'll give it a shot." I was fifty years old at that
time, to be going to school. I hadn't been to school for years, to renew
my certificate, so I told him I would. So that was my adventure. So
then, spring of 72 I enrolled at East Carolina, and I went there for two
sessions that summer, and then went the fall semester and even the
spring semester. I'd go at night, drive back and forth on Tuesdays and
Thursday nights.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's a lot of work.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah, about a three hour drive each way. That's the way we did it, and
we got along well. That was another great experience for me, especially
that summer, spring, summer of 72. I got along great, and I was the only
Native American at that campus. That's right. We had a good time. We got
along real good.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

During this time how many white and Black students were there at
Prospect?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

The most I ever had during my whole tenure there, it was either ten
whites—I want to think it was ten whites—maybe it was ten Blacks and
eleven whites. To my knowledge we've never had any more than that. I
don't know how many's out there this time, but during my whole tenure,
thirteen years I was principal, that was the highest number we ever
had.

Page 25

MALINDA MAYNOR:

And about how big was the student body total?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Almost eleven hundred.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So a lot of ruckus over just a few.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Oh, yeah. Eleven hundred kids. We had a four hundred-enrollment high
school, K-12. All rode the bus together, kindergartners and twelfth
graders rode the bus.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay. So elementary and high school was about eleven hundred?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

And out of that you had twenty-one, twenty-two non-Indian students?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Exactly right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's amazing.[Laughter]

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

It is. It is. That's right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That is amazing.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

And I believe the things, the statements I've made is very factual,
because I've tried not to edit nor delete. I've tried to be very factual
with the information that I've shared with you.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What was your relationship like with the school board at the time?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I didn't have a direct relationship with them at that time because being
a teacher you had no relationship. But after that, and Mr. Harry West,
he was a board member at that time, I got to know them and we
established, I think, a very good relationship with the board members.
Back then Mr. Harry West was the only Native American we had on the
board. That's right.

Page 26

MALINDA MAYNOR:

I had understood that there weren't any before double voting was broken,
but that's not true?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

It wasn't widespread. I won't say yes to that or no, but Mr. Harry I
believe was the first Indian board. You daddy could probably tell you,
verify that. He could tell.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Do you feel like double voting had an impact on your school and on the
relationship with the school board?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

How?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Exactly right. It eliminated some of the feelings that they had, that
existed on a county-wide level, because they helped make the decisions
for the Indian schools, and yet Red Springs could vote on issues that
involved us. Lumberton could vote on issues. Fairmont could vote on
issues. Rowland could vote on issues, and Maxton.

I think I shared this with you. Maxton, the whole city school system
didn't have but fourteen hundred kids in all three schools. They had a
primary, and a middle school, and a high school. They only had fourteen
[hundred] kids, and they had superintendent. They had three principals.
They had assistant superintendents. I don't know how many staff members.
I won't even try to go into that, and all the extra help, and here I was
with eleven hundred kids with one principal and one assistant. And one
janitor and two aides, ma'am.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

My gosh.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's the [unclear]. Exactly right. That's all we had.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Do you feel like that changed after the double voting system
changed?

Page 27

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah, it did change. But at least we could make our vote, and we could
get the people made that we felt was best to represent us, and they
couldn't vote to have input in it. Yeah, that was good. That was one of
the greatest things to happen, eliminated double voting.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What about politics in Prospect, in and around Prospect, in the 1960s.
You know Mr. Harbert was telling me some things about the unified club
and activities that they would do.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

And that club, the United Club of Prospect, its inception was 1955, and
we've kind of got it not political now, but Mr. Lester Bullard was
instrumental. He was the master of this, a great politician. Malcolm
McLeod was the sheriff. We tried to get some deputies up in this
community, and Mr. Lester asked me to go down and talk to the sheriff. I
told him I would, and I went down, and I asked them, I said, "Mr.
McLeod, sheriff, we'd like to have a deputy from the Prospect community,
an Indian, a Native American Deputy." He told me point blank, he said,
"No, no way." And that was it. He just said point blank, and that was
it. No ifs, ands, and buts.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What reason did he give?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No reason. He said, "No, can't do it." He said, "I can't do it," and
that was it. And that, you know, naturally began to mushroom. It began
to grow because we wanted to do something. We wanted some change here.
We're going to do something. We're going to get a deputy up in this
area. I feel like each community needs somebody close by,
representation, inclusiveness.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right.

Page 28

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

This is what is good.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right. That what it seems like what a lot of Indians were fighting for
at that time.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's exactly right, trying to bring about a greater unity on a county
level, not just Prospect. We weren't just trying to uplift Prospect and
omit everybody else. We wanted to grow together. That's the important
thing, grow together.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Let me see. There was another thing that that reminded me of. What was
it? Well, I'll think of it, but I had another question about that time
period where Blacks and whites began to come to the school. What was the
racial composition of the teachers at Prospect?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Okay. I'm trying to think. Was there a Black teacher under Mr. Danford's
administration? I don't think there was, but shortly after that I got
one, two, three, four. I know that during my tenure as principal I hired
four Black teachers, and I'm trying to think how many white teachers. I
got Patsy MacArthur, John MacArthur's son's wife. She was one that I
wanted to hire, and I asked Mr. Allen. He told me, "Mr. Jones," he says,
"you'll probably have trouble with that, hiring her." Because at that
time the politics in the Oxendine community, the MacArthurs they were
whites, and they were in control and everything. He said, "Do you think
that Prospect would accept that?" I said, "Mr. Allen, I believe I can
handle that," and I got her, and he said, "Okay, go ahead." She came in,
and she was s jewel. She was a white teacher, but I got her in here in
industrial arts. That's where she came in, started teaching industrial
arts. The kids loved her. She mingled. She'd mingle with them, and she
got along so well. Then I hired two,

Page 29

I hired a
white girl. She's still up there now. I can't even think of her name
now. It's been so long. Let's see, how many? I'm trying to think how
many. I believe it was only three. I only had about three white teachers
in all.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So four Black teachers and three white teachers?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I think that's right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

And how did the parents respond to those?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Fine. It made them blend right in. No problem. No problem.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

The Black teachers as well?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah, the Black teachers as well.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's interesting. Why would there be so many ruffled feathers about
students going there but not teachers, you reckon?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I don't know. I don't know.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Was it Indian only teachers under Mr. Danford?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Pardon?

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Was it only Indian teachers under Mr. Danford?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I don't believe Mr. Danford had any—. If it was, he didn't have but one
black, maybe one black. I'm trying to think if there was a white
teacher. There may have been. Yes, there was one white teacher. What's
that girl's name? Yeah that's right. Now that I recall back I can see. I
believe there was three white teachers I had. Three white teachers,
yeah.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Three white teachers, but they all came in, hard workers. Got along real
well.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So the racial tensions didn't really exist on the teacher level?

Page 30

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No, on the teacher level out here? No, never.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What about between the students?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No. No. Sure didn't.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Well, I just wonder, so what do you attribute all of the passion over
it? You know what I mean? I'm just thinking about it again, someone
listening to this tape who's not familiar with the community, maybe who
knows a little bit about this time period, but if there's so few
students that we're talking about, there were no teachers, there were
not problems with teachers of other races coming into the community.
There's this issue of tradition, I guess, but tell us. So you look at it
objectively, and it doesn't seem like well, there would be a big deal
here, but it was a big deal. Can you sort of tell us a little bit
about—?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

You know, some of those things I'm not able. I don't want to try to
point out maybe some things that are not really factual issues, but it
seemed that we believed in work at Prospect School. I think this was one
of the things, and we believed in discipline at Prospect School. That's
two things, Miss Maynor, that I think kept us abreast, and kept us
motivated, and kept us going, and that eliminated a lot of other
frivolous things. When the parents would come I'd say, "Listen, this
teacher—."

Yes, there was another teacher that came to my mind. She's down the
Berry section way down below Lumberton. She came up there. She's still
surviving. I remember her too. These things are coming back. So actually
there was four whites. Yeah. Yeah. It might end up at five.

But anyway, there was one thing going back, good hard work and
discipline. Those two things kept Prospect aboard, kept us going, kept
us making, if I may say,

Page 31

progress. That was the
main objective. You come to school to get an education. You don't come
to school to put on no acts. You come to school to get an education, and
if you come you're expected to do your homework. And if you don't do
your homework, boy—and the parents knew this. In the PTA I told the
parents, I told them. They knew. I lived here all my life, and I taught
out there, and they knew if a kid came to my classroom—Miss Maynor, I'm
not boasting but any means. I'm just being factual. They knew if a kid
came to a classroom and didn't have his homework, he had had a bad day.
The paddle was going to go. He knew that. The parents knew that. They
knew that. They said, "You'd better not go in his class unless you got
your homework." They knew that.

And I instilled that in the teachers. I said, "I expect you to work. I
expect you to control your class. You don't send any kids to my office.
You discipline. If I have to go to the board," I said, "I'll lead you.
If you've got to go to court, I'll go with you, and I'll tell them,
'Listen, this is the policy we have here for education, not no action.
If it takes disciplinary action we're going to air it out.'" And I
believe this is the thing that kept a lot of parents, and they accepted
this, they knew this, and they had no objection as long as their kids
was being taught, and as long as their kids was being disciplined.

And most of the parents, I'd say ninety, ninety-five percent of the
parents believed in good, strong discipline. And they supported. I think
this is one of the things that kept the animosity, the ill-will feeling,
or the little frivolous things that surfaced, that's the two things that
I figure that was instrumental in making it go smooth. I really do.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It sounds like there's a lot of consistency, and that the expectations
were the same for everybody.

Right. There's one other thing I want to ask you about that time period,
and then I want to move forward a little bit to the 1980s and your
thoughts about the mergers of the high schools and then of the whole
system, but I want to ask about the Tuscaroras in the 70s, what your
impressions were of that movement? Were they involved in the goings on
at Prospect School?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yes, right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

How?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

The Tuscaroras over at Maxton in the Red Hill section, that's where they
are, and right up here on the Keever Road, but the Red Hill was more
active. They were Tuscaroras, and the Tuscaroras were part of the people
who were supposed to go to Oxendine School. And they said, "We're not
going to Oxendine School. We're not going to Maxton School." They said,
"We're not going to Maxton School." Those Tuscaroras, that's when they
extended the district lines over to Red Hill. They said, "We're not
going to Maxton." And most of them didn't go. They didn't go. Maybe one
or two of them. I'm not sure. I won't put the number on it, but they
didn't go.

They said, "We won't even go to school. We won't even go to school.
We're not sending them to school." We didn't have a truant officer back
then to go out and enforce truancy. Maybe because of the situation the
Native Americans, if they don't get an education maybe that's all right.
They make their own decision. And that's the sad part. If Indians fail
to get an education they're hurting nobody but us. We're hurting
ourselves

Page 33

if we don't get an education. That's the
thing. That was how Tuscarora were dealing with the situation.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So many of those parents who were holding their kids out of Oxendine
then were Tuscarora parents?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

They certainly were.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Do you think that when they took on that identity as Tuscaroras, had
that group of folks always had that, or was that part of their, you know
what I mean, resistance to the situation?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I think they kept a low profile until maybe that period of time, and
they just spurt up suddenly up here. But they kept it low. They had
their little gatherings though, but it wasn't wide spread. It was just a
very few. And they didn't. They'd go ahead and go to school somewhat,
but they didn't boast out, maybe one or two would say, "I'm a
Tuscarora," or something like this. It didn't get out of hand. It didn't
raise to that much other than that one time, and when all of that uproar
was that opening day, the Tuscaroras was right in the midst of that.
They were in the midst of that.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

And they were claiming themselves as Tuscaroras?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Oh they were claiming. That's right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Did that create some opposition or some conflict?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah. Um-hum. It did.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

What kind of conflict?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Well, I'd rather not even go into that issue part of it. I just like to
omit. That's one little tiny bit I'd like to omit and not even share
that with you.

Page 34

MALINDA MAYNOR:

I can understand that. Okay. Well, let's talk about the 1980s. Were you
principal? Let me see, I guess you retired when they merged the high
schools?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

No, I retired one year after.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

One year after that. Okay. So tell us then about leading up to the
merging the high schools. Why was that decision made, and who made
it?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Well, I think the superintendent and some of the board members was
instrumental in bringing this about. There had been a study, so I
understand, made of the conditions of Pembroke, Prospect, and Maxton.
This is the time when we had eliminated all of the city unit. It was all
under one big umbrella then, all big umbrella now.

Our superintendent, he was the honcho. So they said, "Well, we're going
to see if we can change things." One of the issues was that they claimed
the Prospect curriculum was not large enough to equip our students and
to get our students to the level that they should be to advance their
education, going into college and what have you. Maxton at that time it
was a run down school. Their physical plant was so awful. I never did go
inside of Maxton school. Never been inside of one of them. One time I
went to the principal's office at the high school there, Mr. Graham, but
as far as going in the classrooms, I never visited there. Not that I had
anything against them, with the principal, but I just didn't visit the
sites.

They claimed that to rebuild that school would be so expensive they
couldn't do it from a financial standpoint. They said, "Well, let's put
them all together." Let's merge, consolidate, whichever term you feel is
appropriate.

They had public hearings on them, and when they came to Prospect, the
public hearing, there was opposition, strong opposition, of them doing
this. James Moore, he

Page 35

would be another one if you
wanted to interview him sometime, he was against it. I was against it,
and there were a few more folks against it. We spoke up that night. We
felt like this is not the best thing. And I told you about how Mr.
Swett, and how I felt about Prospect. I shared that with you
earlier.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Tell us that again because I didn't get that on tape last time. You're
talking about Mr. Purnell Swett.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Mr. Purnell Swett.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

The first Indian school superintendent.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right. Right. So he came, and he asked me my feelings about it. I was
not in favor of it, and I asked him specifically. I said, "Now, Mr.
Swett, I want to know how this is going to help Prospect School,
individually. Not Pembroke. Not Maxton. How will it help Prospect?" So
Mr. Swett, he says, "It won't help Prospect." Well, I said, "Mr. Swett,"
and we were of good humor, I said, "I'm kind of prejudiced and biased. I
want Prospect to come out the best." And he kind of smiled, but he says,
"It won't." I said, "You don't want me to support something that's not
going to help Prospect." He smiled, and walked away, and that was the
end of that.

It finally came, but the big issue, I think, was that Prospect, their
curriculum was not enough to justify it, but we had all the goods right
there. I said, "Look at the people we've got that's come out of
Prospect. We've got the lawyers. We've got the doctors. We've got the
plant managers that's come right out of Prospect School with this little
curriculum." And I attribute this to the fact that our teachers, most of
the teachers knew every parent. And I'm not boasting again on this, and
I hope this won't sound like I'm

Page 36

boasting. But I
could walk in the classrooms, and I could name ninety percent of those
kids' parents, because I taught, I taught a lot of their parents. If a
problem surfaced, I said, "Do you want me to talk to your mother and
daddy about you?" "No, Mr. Jones. No." That eliminated the discipline
right there, and they knew what was expected. Those parents knew, the
ones that I taught, they knew what I expected. That was the end of it.

This is the thing, but it seemed that the power was to have a big
school, big number. And I'm sorry to say, that it hasn't gelled in my
opinion. It hasn't gelled. I'm going to die pretty soon, and this would
be one of my greatest desires, that it would gel. But I'm afraid, I
doubt it. I hope you live to see it. I hope you'll be able to sit down
and talk to Jim. He said it wouldn't, but he said it has gone on and it
has become a reality. I hope it will. I hope it will, but I doubt
seriously. And I think, I don't think I know, it's left some marks from
crossing the lines, from racial issues, that's not left Prospect
community happy.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

So it hasn't benefited Prospect? What do you think has been the impact
on the kids that live here and have to go down to Purnell Swett High
School?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Detrimental. They don't feel like they belong. That's right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Is there something you feel like could be done to change that
situation?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I've been asked that question so many times. I don't know if there is
anything that you could put your finger on that would bring an instant
change, but I guess if we keep working at it, don't give up, have hope
and faith, keep striving. One of the big issues right now is our kids.
And I don't know how Prospect compares to others, but I know we got some
of them dropping out. The drop out rate is

If they could eliminate that, that would be a great asset. And they're
doing, I understand, everything literally possible, if I must use this
everyday language, to try to eradicate it. They've got after schools,
Saturday schools, evening schools, everything to try to motivate them to
keep them going. But for some reason they fall by the wayside. That's
one of the issues. If they could eliminate that, and I understand
they're spending big bucks to try to eradicate it, but to no avail. That
one of the things.

And then, I hate to say it, but when they went over there—I don't even
want to say that—the races, the Blacks and the girls and the boys band
together. That's not being good to our kids. It's not being good. And
the parents are upset about it, and this kind of thing. They go with it.
What did you expect? And there's animosity just about every day in the
halls. The Blacks say the least little thing and it sparks. It's ready
to explode instantly from what I've been told. I haven't been over
there. I don't know. I guess Mr. Wes [the principal] is doing the best
he possibly can, but it's just before happening. A bomb just set to
explode. That's sad. That's sad.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It feels like especially like after all the work that's been done.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's right, to try to prevent it. But you live under that pressure.
And I'm sure those teachers live there expecting that anything could
happen—massive fight in the halls. This kind of thing. I hope it don't.
Teachers don't have to live every day, every minute of their lives there
might be a gun and start shooting in there. This is the kind of thing.
But all of what's happened all around, naturally. That's in the back [of
their

Page 38

minds] right there. They think about it. How
many more kids will get upset if you dismiss them from school, and come
in there, walk in AK47?

MALINDA MAYNOR:

I hope not.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I hope not, too. That's the thing. My, my, my, my. It something we never
thought of to think of like that. We didn't have that problem at
Prospect. The kids didn't even have weapons. And I told those boys, the
first day of school, I'd tell those kids, high school, "If you bring a
weapon to school, by mistake," being out on the farm those boys have
knives and things, I said, "You go to Mr. Can's office, you give it to
him." And I says, "That after noon he'll give it back to you. Just don't
bring it." Now I said, "If you bring it, we're going to get it, take it,
confiscate it." But I said, "Now, if we catch you during the middle of
the day with it, and somebody will tell you've got it, we're going to
get it." And I said, "I'll keep it. I love to fish. That will be my
fishing knife." And I talked just in that tone. They knew that. That's
the way we operated, and we didn't have no major problems. Those kids
knew. They knew what to expect, and we pre-warned them. I'm telling you
the first day. You can't say, "Well, I didn't know."

I'd meet with the whole high school the first day. Everybody knew what
was expected at high school. That's the place you spent more of your
time and things could get out of hand. You expected disputes,
disruptions and things of that nature, but that's what it all was. And
the little mini-fights we had there, most of the time it was two girls
fighting over a boy. [JJ laughs.] Maybe I shouldn't have even said that.
But that's little things like that. That's it.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It's interesting that some people say, "Well, we'll look at all the ways
that children have benefited from greater access and inclusion in the
school system," but then

Page 39

on the other hand there's
this side of it where the kids from Prospect feel like they don't
belong, they're going to be harmed. Is that your feeling?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's exactly right. That's right. We've got some that's going on.
Someone has said that the better ones is going to progress in spite of
it. That's a statement that's used quite often. Then you've got the
upper, the elites. They're going to go. They're going to get it
somewhere. But then you've got a group in there that's got to deal with
it. Then these ones on the bottom, you've got to do everything you can
to keep them in.

Those kids that came from Oxendine School that came to Prospect, this
was my greater absentee area. I knew this, and I worked with this. High
school attendance, the kids from Oxendine they'd stay out up there for
little frivolous things. I had to prod them on, "I expect you to be in
school," and this kind of thing.

Okay, over there, these teachers they don't know these parents. They
don't know their parents. Well, I knew your parents, and I could tell
somebody else in the class, "I expect you to kind of keep him in
school," and they'd say, "I'll call their parents." That's the
percentage you're losing. That's the percentage that drop out right
there. And then this other, you've got to do what you can with the
middle section. These up here, you just keep them motivated, and they're
going to go on. They're going to go on. But when you start losing four
hundred kids, that's a bunch of kids out of sixteen-plus hundred.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Yeah. Well, just out of curiosity, what was the drop out rate like when
Prospect High School existed?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I daren't say we had a three percent drop out.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

And now it's what? Nine or something? Six or nine.

Page 40

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Probably. Yeah.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It sounds like it makes a big difference. That's about all the questions
I have. Now, what else do you feel like you'd want to say that I've left
out?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I think you've covered it from an educational standpoint and a community
standpoint. I think you've been very inclusive. I really do.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay. Yeah, because I wanted to try to get at the relationship between
the school and the community. That seems like something that in some
ways makes Indian education, maybe not unique is the right word, but it
definitely defines it.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

It definitely helps you to understand it if you understand that
relationship. Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

And I want to think that maybe we're making progress with all the things
that's happening now, especially as I look at our little capital now
there [Pembroke]. We've got a new town office. We're getting a big
Wal-Mart coming in, and another big Kerr Drugs is there. I understand
some more new things are supposed to.

It's beginning to look like a university town, and that's what I want to
see, exemplify the university image. This is a university town. Been
that way since eighteen— something like that. It's been a long time
coming, but it looks like we've moving ahead by leaps and bounds, and
I'm so happy. I'm so happy for it. I would like to see them eventually
get 10,000 students, and maybe one day have a football team. You know,
we had a football team when I was there.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Right, right. Well Jesse Oxendine, you know my cousin, was big on the
football team, and there was a lot of people.

Page 41

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Right. Quarterback. He was a quarterback. Curt Locklear played on that
team, you know. And big Steven Lowry, I believe he's connected in your
family somewhere.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Um-hum.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Okay, he was on the team. Warren Carter. In fact, I was even on the
football team.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Were you?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Yeah. I like to say I was on the baseball team. Joe Sampson, the coach.
We had a pretty good baseball team, too. Tom Oxendine.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Yeah, lots of stories about him.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's right. I remember the day he left school. Tried to get me to go
with him. The first time he left school going to Lumberton. [unclear]. He says, "Come and go with me." I said, "I don't believe I
will." Sometimes I think about that. He looked at it. He got through,
you know. He was one of the ones that came back. So many of them didn't.
Wasn't as fortunate. Wasn't as fortunate.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

That's the truth.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

A lot of them went down in the Pacific, and Mediterranean, and those
places. Pshew. Gosh. But he was fortunate. I guess the good Lord as on
his side of the rail. He came from that kind of a home. And I definitely
think this is the thing.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Yeah, that makes a big difference.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

It makes a big difference. And I said all the time, I told my wife, and
I told my son, prayers from people are the reason they were able to get
back.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Um-hum.

Page 42

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

He had a hand up there shielding himself, and did it to all of them for
their prayers.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Do you want to talk a little bit, one thing I didn't really ask you
about, I didn't really ask you about your parents.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Okay.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

And your household, and their value on education. A lot of people trace
it back to their parents.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

This is my mother and my father.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

They're cute.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

My mother, you heard of Oakley McMillan?

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Yes.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

That's her father.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Her name was Rosie Belle McMillan.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Rosie Belle.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

And she was a big, big lady. And that was my father. He was a Jones,
McKinley Jones.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

My mother grew up with some of Oakley's children and grandchildren.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

I know that. That's right. My mother came from a two family. She was the
only daughter, and Lofty McMillan was her brother. That was the size of
the family. And my grand daddy, he was one of the big land owners in the
area. In fact this land that we're residing on now was his. He had farms
over in the Red Banks area over there. And my father, his father Elijah
Jones, believe it or not, my mother and father, the only

Page 43

thing that separated them when they were little boys and
girls was a fence just like you see right out there. Their lands joined.
Their houses was close together, a hundred yards apart. That's how close
their land was. My grandfather and my grandmother on both sides had
their lands joined right there on Red Banks, at this edge of Red Banks.

And my dad—see, my mother died at thirty-nine and passed away, and I was
just finishing high school, but my dad wanted me to go to school, and
when I came back [from the war] my dad remarried. He married Zelma
Sampson. I came back, and I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, but she
came back, and she says, "I want you to go to finish your education."
And she [unclear] my dad too [unclear], and I went.

And that's where I picked up right there, and I got involved in
education. I've enjoyed it. I have no regrets about my education and
career. It's been really good. I've enjoyed it. I worked, but I enjoyed.
I worked, and I enjoyed it, and I farmed the whole time this little farm
here.

That lady that you see around there, while I was gone she'd take over. I
went to East Carolina that summer, she ran that tractor and plowed this
farm. That's right. And she's been my life's support from day one. We
got married after I came back from service. In fact, we were married
when I started back to college, and she's stuck with me through thick
and thin. Yes, she's been a great supporter. A great supporter. But my
dad really, and Mamma Zel, and your daddy [unclear], and she encouraged me. Highly encouraged me. "Go back to
school. Go back to school." And chances are if they hadn't kept perking,
I probably wouldn't have gone back in there.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Yeah. Well, you need that influence.

Page 44

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

Definitely. Definitely, and I've tried to instill that in our kids. "Go
on, get your education." All three of them finished at Pembroke, and I'm
proud of that. And I told you, we've got a son at Purnell Swett.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

No. He's a teacher there?

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

He's a teacher. He's teaching in the science department.

MALINDA MAYNOR:

Okay.

JAMES ARTHUR JONES:

James Jones. Jimmy, we call him Jimmy. He and Jimmy Goins—who's that
tribal chief right now? Three musketeers they were always called in
school.